mount vernon, a discussion about the united states constitution and how it has evolved over more than two centuries. then at 7:00 p.m. eastern, a tour of the smithsonian national washer galleries 1898 exhibit, with portraits of the major players in the spanish-american war, illustrating the expansion of u.s. interest and influence abroad in that era. at 8:00 p.m. eastern, on lectures in history, marquette university political science professor. on the life and presidency of jimmy carter. and at 9:30, on the presidency, a luncheon remembering first ladies pat nixon and betty ford who served active actors in the white house from 1969 to 1977, hosted by the gerald ford presidential foundation. speakers include ms. nixon's son-in-law, edward cox, and ms forde's daughter, susan ford bails. watch american history tv, saturdays on c-span 2 . and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at c-span .org/history.

>> a healthy democracy doesn't just look like this. it looks like this. where americans can see democracy at work, where citizens are truly informed, our republic drives. get informed straight from the source on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. from the nation's capital to wherever you are. because the opinion that matters the most is your own. this is what democracy looks like. c-span, powered by cable. and s n pfaelzer here with a new book, n california a slave state. and we're going to go through the history that i'm going to talk about the ideas behind it a little bit and also her work on the reparation committee. so jeanie, thanks so much for for joining us at the commonwealth club. thank you. i'm glad to be back here. thank you so as i said, let's start with history. so let's go back as far you into this history as we go we won't

go all the way back to the native american tribes, but that's a good place to stop it. let's do terminology first. in your book, you use lots different terminologies. native americans native indians. how you make that choice. first of all, you use a lot of different. but i know that this is sort of a an important issue because a lot of tribes, like certain names, don't like other names. and i thought, how did you make your academic about that? well, i think it's really important. start with the idea that california tribes did not have a history of slavery, that there was an occasional somebody who was a victor in a war who was taken, negotiated, but for the most part, especially all the coastal tribes, there just was not a long history of slavery as as think of it. so let's clear that one. yeah, that's right. one out right away.

and in terms of talking about american people, a lot of native american still use and prefer the word indian despite all of the history that think of when we think of that term and i use word native american it was relevant i use the word such as the bazaar to act for the government and protection of the indian which legalized the slavery of california native people. i tried to use the tribes names when they were available. a lot of this history is going on at same time as genocide in california. many tribes were in flight and congress did not want to give land to california. native americans, and so they set up very few the very, very

remote reservoir where tribes were blended together. so sometimes it was just hard to find out who was where. the reservation and weren't well guarded and people were transported under guard and then they fled. so there was a lot of movement of native americans around california during that time. and i just had no way often of knowing who i was talking in terms of tribal origin. and then i use the word native american, or when it would come up, i would use the word indi knowingan who i was talking abo in terms of tribal origin, then i used the word native american, or when it would come up, i would use the word indian. sometimes i would use the word tribal people. >> great, so, i just think it

is important because it is hard, you cannot make every group copy using the terms, because everybody has their preferred term. and your choice, i think it is important that the concern that we have a -- this is how you ha to decide in the book. so, the thousands of years of native american history here in california that preceded the will start with this slavery that came with the spanish, but the spanish missions -- why don't you tell the stories of how the spanish decided, including talking about father sarah, to come up to california, and why they did it, it was interesting. >> the first slaves, enslaved people, um, were native

americans who were enslaved by the franciscan missionaries, they were enslaved by stan, in the 18th century, in 1769 point gina sarah crosses the border at california right at san diego. he comes by land, he was wounded, he is determined to walk across the border, and he walks wounded with a seeping leg. from the mother mission in laredo, in baja, california, and he walks north, and he meets up with the contingent of 100 spanish soldiers and eight fanatical priests come across the border at san diego, and

some come by sea. the local people in san diego are appalled at this invasion. they are a little bit curious by the fancy gold crosses, but mostly, they are watching these ships, especially the two ships keep unloading dead sailors. so, this isn't a very impressive, attractive conversioney moment. at the spanish, -- >> those soldiers were dead because of the terrors of the travel, not because they were assassinated? >> no, they weren't assassinated. >> died en route. >> they died en route from disease and hunger and malnutrition, so, the first thing they see are these dead bodies being unloaded from the ships. not so persuasive. the spanish, under orders to expand the spanish empire into

california. they have two goals. the first goal is to stop the russians who were coming from the north. nothing i learned at hamilton high school in los angeles, but the russians were in fact from a the north. >> i thought russian river was just a vacation resort. >> haven't been invited there yet, not likely. so, they are supposed to stop the russians who are coming from the north, they are under p a papal bull, an order to convert california tribes to catholicism. the spanish empire isn't very happy with the jesuits, and they hand off the northern mission project to the franciscans. so, the order is to occupy california and to use the

fertile land, the fields of california to provide food for the native american people, the indigenous people, who have been captured and are forced to do the silver mines in mexico and in peru. so, they want to feed the people, they want to extend mexico's sovereignty, although they own the land from baja into alto, california, and stop the russians coming from the north. and so, the plan is to set up slave plantations to grow food, but also with this theological sidebar. which is to convert all of the native american people along the coast of california to catholicism. >> well, we have so much cruelty to cover in just one hour that i think the mission

is most well-known pieces of this, but this was the start of institutionalized slavery in california. >> i think it is really important today to not only focus on the issue of cruelty. that every single place, there was slavery in california, there were fights, escapes, crazy, organized slavery that brought the mission system to an end. we didn't learn about this, our kids didn't learn about this in the fourth grade mission project. but the people within a couple of years of sarah setting up the mission in san diego and have entrapped the people into the mission, the people organized a revolt. so, this is why i just want to --

>> let's talk about the revolt, because i was just in sacramento actually, at the california museum, and one of the nice people they are honoring his toy arena. why don't you tell her story? that is a good one? >> all right, there are lots of stories. the people sleep down from the nieces and the coastline. they lived in small clans all over san diego county, and what we now think of as baja, california, and they planned it, they carved the arrows, then the new bows, and they sleep down and they burn san diego mission, they kill the head priest, padre jaime, and they free all of the kumeyaay people, never to return. so, the story it starts with the slave revolt that i didn't know about.

[ indescernible ] in the valley, north of l.a., and she is a teenager, she has been designated as a shaman, she is totally stoked up on tv. she is pretty much stoned out, as far as i can tell, much of the time. and toypurina is designated a shaman, and she is urged to lead a revolt at mission san gabriel, which is the mission in what we now call the valley. and a lot of people are encouraging her to do this, and she gathers the people together, and [ indescernible ] so, just as they are crossing the wall to free the people at mission san gabriel, she is captured. along with all the other rebels. andli she is sort of one of my

heroines, because when they captured her, they want her to testify, and they give her a little bit in his stool, and she says, i will not sit on your stool. and she stands during her testimony, and charges them with the captivity of her people. and she is sent to one of the presidio's, the presidio's workforce or jails. she is sent to one of the presidio's lsforever, she is banned from her people. and her revolt fails. other revolts succeed. what i also didn't know, thinking about the fourth grade mission project, is that there is an organized slave revolt at mission santa barbara, santa ynez, mission san paris samoa, and they take over the

missions, and all of the native people who are captured at those missions flee into the two leaves. and they escape. they are chased by the mexican military. at this point, california is owned by mexico. they escape and the military chases them. the horses can't make it through the marshes, and they finally rolled through with the canon and blast the people open. many are slaughtered, some are forced to return. and most of them flee into the marshes. so, the slave revolts the mission by mission by mission, whether it is the kumeyaay or not, and together, they bring down the mission system. what also brings down the mission system is that mexico wants this land. they don't care about the

mission system. >> once mexico takes over from spain -- [ indescernible ] >> yeah, so theories of forces come together to bring the missions down, then the question is what is mexico going to do with all of this land, and i found these incredible documents where the tribal people at the different missions demand the land that they have been forced to turn from their land into mission land. and they demand their land back, they demand freedom, and they actually demand the right to vote, which they don't get >> the toypurina story, if she had only been joint burned at the stake, it would have been joan of arc all over again, you know? >> that's really weird. >> a very similar story, you know? >> i mean, toypurina never saw herself as a murderer. she really saw herself as a

leader and charismatic and divine, a spiritual leader, a shaman, a leader of her people. and she did not plan to lose. they do figure it out quite perfectly. >> i am sure joan wanted to win, two point so, let's cover the russians, because that is a part that a lot of people don't understand, and one of your statistics was fantastic, which was that 16 of the russian government expenditures in the year went to try to set up this trade, and the other one that was fascinating was how much an otter pelt sold for in beijing. what motivated the russians to come in. nd it wasn't the same motive at all as the spanish.

[ indescernible ] if we look at pictures now of the chinese mandarin class and we see the is huge for callers and moths and rings around the roads, that is otter for for the most part, and a lot of it came from california. the russians have crossed the streets, they are thinking they are going to find a route to china, just the eternal route to china, and they don't find it. barry is shipwrecked on a rock, bearing dies, and he spends this horrible winter, well, he's dead, but his people, his sailors spent this horrible winter on the rocks, and as the ice melts, they find otter fur,

and they rebuild their broken ship. the ice doesn't melt until may. and they take it back to russia and they delivered to the emperor 1000 otter pelts, and the pelts were selling in the currency of the time for $3500 per pelts. and they have taken back 1000 of these pelts. and they call it soft gold, and this is going to save the broken russian empire. so, no route to china, but a route to incredible wealth and prosperity. and to make it work, russia creates the russian american company, and in the charter, it says that the russian fur ou hunters are allowed to enslave 50% of the alaska native men. the alaska native men in their kayaks are the only ones who are really skillful enough to kill the otter.

so, there is a different slave triangle of alaska, california, cancun, that grows out of that. when i lived in berkeley, we would go to fort ross and we would take a bottle of wine and eat the little russian cookie is and the little girls with the aprons, the butter cookies. i had no idea that fort ross was a slave plantation, and that's where russia bases this trade out of. they are scared of the spanish, so they deposit the otter hunters on the islands and they abandon them for six months, and american, actually boston whaling ships sailed by, pick up the pelts, leave them a bag of flour, and told to survive, and they are guarded by a russian soldier. there are also alaskan native women who are creating these

skin kayaks, an incredible waterproof clothing, they are made out of the gut, usually of the sea lion, totally waterproof clothing. and the women so and they coil and stitch the kayaks. the alaskan natives paddle up what we call the russian river now. they were scared to go to shore, because that's where the spanish were. and so, also, for those of you who have spent time on the rather smelly islands, they are surrounded by sharks. so, it wasn't an easy escape for the alaska native people and they are far from home. >> it is amazing how cavalier they were about using these people, and then just leaving them. like even in their own self

interests, it seems like they would have taken slightly better care of them. >> i think self interest and the economics of enslavement don't necessarily mean to treat is working people well. ever. >> it really doesn't seem that way. >> i mean, part of the definition of slavery involves forced mobility, violence, constriction, starvation, fear, threats about the people still at home, so, it's not a labor force that tends to be treated with respect. >> ray, the question for me for you is that has been going on for all of human history. in lots of places, most times not quite as bad as some of the stuff we have had, but still very bad. do you have any idea, having studied this so thoroughly, why we are so cruel to somebody

else? why would we do that? >> no. >> no answer, okay. >> i have lived with this book for almost eight years. with time-out life for covid. and at the end of it, and maybe it is my optimistic dna that i got from my dad, my politics, i don't have -- i don't know if anybody here has an explanation for human evil and brutality. i can say that it was about profit, it was about conquest of land, it was about expansion. it was about power, but at the end of the day, i don't know, i truly do not know how i wrote this book and i don't have an explanation for human evil.

>> it is interesting that some of the other things that you mentioned -- i'm going to jump time friends for just a second year to 1850s in san francisco, and you mentioned that the murder rate for the first six years after the gold rush in san francisco, that 1200 people were murdered in those six years in that town, and it seems to me, i don't have the exact statistics, but maybe the average number of people in the town was 25,000 during those six years, that would be a murder rate of 800 per 100,000 people. right now, our murder rate is 6.9 per 100,000 people, and lewis is out about 65 or something like that, which is the highest in the united states. the murder rate in san francisco is 800, so it is 100 times worse than it is now, and it was an all-male society, as we know, or almost all-male society, and it wasn't exactly

the highly educated that came, i mean, certainly am, but it ma was a rough crowd. and this rough crowd, i think it has to do with something in psychology, that if you feel that you are at the dregs, you have to make somebody else feel worse than you are, so you can feel you're on top of them. something like that. >> i mean, the gold rush brought a lot of greed, a lot of violence, a lot of petty crime. a loaf of bread was selling for $18 for a loaf of bread. people were starving. so, and people were violence, and this aura of gold brought people from all over the world. the news of gold traveled the pacific rim very quickly, it was easier to get here in san francisco from china or from chile or argentina where there

were skillful gold miners, a tradition of gold mining. it was easier to get here from latin south america and from asia than it was to either cross the plans or cross through the jungles of panama to come here. so, it was a highly male population, butd that would ha to leave out all of the native american women who were here and the chinese girls who were kidnapped from the port cities and brought here as enslaved prostitutes to service this very -- what was called then a bachelor town or bachelor community. so, it was a violent, greedy, masculine town, but it wasn't -- i wouldn't construct all of the gold miners as the dregs of society.

we know that -- well, i didn't know, i know now that plantation owners crossed the plains or through the jungles of panamake, very wealthy plantation owners, bringing with them two, three, or four enslaved african american men, who walked across the plains or who carried their owners equipment and gambling tents and mining equipment through the jungles of panama, up one side of the river, down the other, and waited on the other side with thousands of miners competing on little ships to g bring them up to san francisco, and then to go on to sacramento, which was the base for the gold rush. so, there were very wealthy people, and people are making money, making profit off of the gold rush, and off of enslaved people to do the really nasty work of standing up to hear,

you know, in the mud, looking for, well, the gold nuggets. n they are looking for little slivers of gold dust, which is nasty, dirty, cold, muddy work. a lot of the plantation owners when they get here realize they are not up for it. and they want to go back point >> yeah, it was a fascinating part, not only that element of it, bringing slaves, but of the politics of early california, was that there was such a large number of southern plantation owners. did you come across anything that showed it was an intentional attempt to send some people from the south in order to try to influence the decision about whether california would be a slave state, because this was before the missouri compromise, and i know that people had sent from the south to missouri to try to.

influence the vote there and other places, so was california part of that? was it intentional or just that the gold grabs people's attention? >> well, i think gold was huge, bringing people to california, it was men, they wanted adventure, they wanted to get away from home. the u.s. had just won in 1848 the war against mexico, and we have taken, we, the united states, have walked off and taken the top half of mexico. some numbers are 55% of mexico. all of a sudden in 1848, becomes american, and then the issue is what do we do with it? and the pressure is on with gold to get california to quickly -- into the united states. california is sending back annually and the money of the time $1.2 billion of gold, back

to the banks, the insurance company, the shipping company is in the east coast, so, this one for one, one free state, one slave state, will enter in a paired way, that is done, because there is no state to pair with california.e it isn't even ever legally a territory out west that quickly has to become a state. and plantation owners have always wanted the -- have always wanted slavery to go west. and part of the pressure for the mexican american war, the war against mexico, is to grab as much territory as they can and turn it into areas where slavery could thrive. mainly, people were thinking tobacco and cotton. tobacco and cotton are horrible for the land.

and the land in the south was in bad shape. the solution was just expand slavery to the west. it expands very quickly into texas. right away, there are 200,000 enslaved african americans in texas. very quickly. in fact, some of the plantation owners don't even bother to bring slaves from their own plantation with them, they are just going to buy them in route to california and go through northern texas, and take them off of a cotton field. >> one of the stories that you told that was very interesting, it was a small story, but it was a revolt of free blacks in california in the 1850s that thought that they were going to be free here, and it didn't work out that way. and a whole group of them moved to british columbia, which reminded me of how a large group of free blacks in new orleans moved to mexico and central america at the same

time, and that part of the story isn't told very often either, that america was such an awful place to live that people were leaving to go to other countries in order to avoid the serious issue. >> yeah. in the 1850s, free blacks from -- in the 1850s, free blacks wanted to come to california for the gold rush, just like everybody else. and wanted the money, the adventure, but what free black people in the northeast were facing was the fugitive slave law.tt so, in addition to all of the reasons white men were coming west, there was this real pressure to get away from the fugitive slave law, which pretty much made it available for white people to ensnare any black person they saw, and sell them, sell them or transport

them south. so, frederick douglass, the great abolitionist, says to his incredible community of free black people, don't go. you know, we are in the midst, the height of the abolitionist movement. it will betray our cause for freedom for you to leave now. and they say, douglas, we are out of here. we have the same right as every other person to access to this wealth, and we have got to get out of here point douglas says back to them, okay, and he picks a few of them, including one of the men, an important figure in california history. he says to gibbs, okay, you can go with my blessing, but travelb with me for a summer, so you learn how to be an organizer. and they see it all.

they see the burned churches, they see the violence, and gibbs comes out here and becomes one of the leaders of free black people in california, and he meets up with other free black people who have come out here, too. they don't expect to find enslaved blacks in california, they do not expect to find enslaved black people in california up in the minds or in the streets of san francisco. >> the constitution was against it. sort of. >> well, no, it is dicey because california quickly writes a constitution, so it can join the united states, and it is supposed to enter as a free state. that is the deal. but it writes into the constitution, slavery will not be tolerated in california. and it is a loophole.

tolerate is not a legal standard.at and they write this buyout into the constitution of the 44 white people who write the constitution, many were southern slaveholders, they know just what they are doing, it is a deliberate out, and it is built into this freedom constitution, so, there is a big debate in washington whether or not we are actually going to admit california. it takes a year, from 49 to 50, to admit california into the united states. but the minute it happens, the very first law, the very first law that is passed in california is the 1850 act for the government and protection of the ndn. our very first law is to legalize the capture, the forced indenture, and enslavement of the native

american people. that is our first duty under we will not tolerate slavery but we never meant it. >> yeah, never meant it. some pretty famous characters from that period of time who were all in favor of it, whose names are still dotted all over our location. >> southern? hastings, whose name was just removed from hastings law school. it is getting one of these generic university of california -- i don't know how many of those names are going to keep recycling before they start to honor some of the true heroes of the first civil rights movement in california. >> and in addition to the slavery, there was intentional massacring of people, two point >> this is all happening against what historian then madly in his amazing, thorough book,

american genocide, documented for all of us. it is all happening against the california genocide, that as soon as the united states takest california, wins it in the war against mexico, they bring in the american military, and the plan is to open up all of the land of california for settlers. the academic term of settler colonialism fits perfectly. and the idea is we will conquer through settlement, but we can't conquer through settlement, because there are 250 native american tribes in california. the solution is to slaughter the men on the theory that they were the warriors, to torch the villages, and the women and children are on the run.

they are the ones who are most vulnerable under the act for the government protection of the indian. so, the native american population, by slaughter, by torching the food supplies and the villages, and people are on the run, become -- become vulnerable.ab and also, the tribes are decimated. the numbers vary, but people pretty much agree that there us were about 310,000 native american people in california at the time that the spanish invaded. the numbers i have read go- between 6000 and 30,000 people, native american people live through the gold rush. so, from 310,000 two top it at 30,000 people is a horrific genocide, and the people who

were available for captivity, to be this labor force, who is going to work here? who is going to farm these fields and grow the orchards and vineyards? enslaved people. right now, a fair bit of that labor from the orchards, the vineyards, up to the cannabis grows in the emerald triangle, are people who have been trafficked, people who have been human traffic. the desperate greed for an unpaid labor force drives the creation, like the tectonic plates, it drives the creation of the state. >> we just went right up to modern-day time. >> please get some. >> we skipped a little bit, but yes, there are lots of details, we will go back a little bit, but why don't we just discuss that a little bit? what i find -- comparative in your book, you talk about

humble colony and the extreme use of unpaid labor or slave labor or people who disappear, into when it was illegal, and even now, half of it is still illegal, because they don't want to follow the cause of becoming legal for creating marijuana. and it reminded me of the otter pellets. you know, the otter pellets where a fashion in beijing. marijuana is a fashion in the united states. without -- if the mandarins had said we don't want the otter pellets and we don't care about pellets and we don't care about auditors would have been left alone and there wouldn't have been this entire destruction of civilization along that coast. we know very well that american use of drugs is causing this destruction and lots of places, including in california. of civilizations, in order to supply the drug. so, maybe we will talk about that when we get to reparations

or how to deal with the problem, but it is partially driven, these things are driven by other people's desires. fashions even. >> i think that the notion of free labor and unpaid labor, involuntary labor, um, is part of the thread that has created california, and it goes through working backwards. if we think of modern human trafficking, and working backwards from that, if we think about the car several state and the unpaid labor in our prison system, where people are building the furniture that we use, the clothing that we wear, the penitentiaries in california are still subcontracting convicts, unpaid

people who are fed, clothed, guarded by our taxpayer dollars. and yet, the profits of their labor are going into private industries for t-shirts and sweatpants and stuff that we have no idea what we are wearing, where what we are using is being produced in our modern prison system. the birth of the car several state in california is san quentin, and as as san quentin is built by the prisoners themselves, this corrupt contractor rents it out to private industries. e >> he was quite a character. didn't cover him into much detail, but that was a fascinating story. james. he got the governor and everything to approve of what

he was doing, and he just seemed like the warden from hell point >> yeah, what difference does is he gets the idea that he can get free labor from convicts, he and he gets the legislature to agree that all of the jails in california and little towns will send him there prisoners, and they become convicts. he starts with chain gangs, and he also takes out in san francisco, i guess it is that way, he takes their 400 ships in san francisco bay that have been abandoned. they have come out for the gold rush, the captains and the s sailors go, there is a lot more money up in the sierras and the gold, then there is shipping other people back and forth. they abandon ships and they are rotting in the bay, and he

takes two of them and he takes all of these convicts that havef been sent to him, and the legislature gives him the right to the full profit of their labor. and he assails these ships all over san francisco bay and the convicts build the sewage system of san francisco, they build the streets of san francisco, he hires them out to build some of the mansions in san francisco, and finally, the legislature says, james, get on with it, build the penitentiary. and he forces this group of prisoners to build their own present in san quentin. it is not the right place. san quentin is on a peninsula, it is not an island, people are not happy, it is really easy to escape, because it is not an island. >> i like the little details, or also easy to escape because they built it and they didn't put the mortar in and some of the bricks and different places that they knew about, so they could push their way out again.

that is the way to resist a little bit. [ laughter ] >> they used default water for the mortar, and they knew exactly which bricks were implanted by saltwater rather than glued together properly, so when they wanted to escape, they just punched their way out and left. they also kept rowboats right ' in front of san quentin, and there are these great stories of people just rolling away. i mean, if we want to track back too my rebels. commitment to slave revolt, >> we are on your side, don't worry. [ laughter ] >> thank you. that there was in the 1850s 1000 prisoners at san quentin, go on strike. it is, i believe, the biggest prison strike up until attica prison. so, the spirit to be free, to

not be doing this slave labor, and to be tortured for doing it , san quentin copies the prison system from the east coast. and what they also copy are the forms of torture that were used in auburn prison in new york and in pennsylvania, they called it the quicker system. and that is transported into san quentin. so, when you are working in these mills inside san quentin prison, you are standing for 12 hours a day, forced to be silent. i could not be silent for 12 hours. [ indescernible ] and it is the torture for talking, for moving, and the hunger and the rancid food. they had the sewage system

dripping into the kitchen at san quentin. wh so, the prisoners who were forced to work in the kitchen know exactly how contaminated the food is and how dangerous it is to eat when they are so hungry. >> well, we are jumping around here, let's back up on something bigger, we have had a lot of programs here over the last decade -- mass imprisonment of so many people, and how in america -- how that is a new form of slavery. and that the number of people, when you add up the imprisonment of not people for violent crimes, but just the people for more minor crimes or drug crimes , plus the human trafficking, that there are more slaves now than there ever were in america. people make that conclusion that there are so many millions

of people involved in our not called slave system and not as vicious perhaps as the worst of hours slave systems have been when it was legal, but still, very serious form of slavery for millions of people, and why don't we pay more attention to this? >> california has got the fifth largest economy in the world. i mean, if we think now of the competition between russia and the united states and china for where the prophet is being driven from, that california still has the fifth largest economy in the world. it is currently the 10th largest -- san francisco is the 10th largest city site of human trafficking in the united states. the 10th largest city for human trafficking in the u.s. it is phenomenal, the endurance of the greed for unpaid labor and agreed to control other

people's bodies, and i think we need to reference, too, the control of women's bodies, that at each of these iterations of slavery that we are talking about, whether it is the missions, the russians, girls at the indian boarding schools, who were sent out into what was called the outing programs, that these children who were required to get an education, but there are no schools on the reservation, so it is a setup for the indian boarding schools, and the biggest one was at riverside, the sherman boarding school. these kids, the day they come in, are stripped of their native clothing, not allowed to speak their native languages, not allowed to talk to their siblings who are also in these schools. sherman looks like taco bell, it is built to look like a

mission. you know, if we want to think about architecture, i don't think that is an accident to rs have it copy the architecture of the missions. and these kids are sent through the outing programs, each of these schools have an outing matron, and their job effectively is to be slave brokers, and they sent the girls in to work in the hotels and the boys to work in the new orange groves, that the girls who were sent into these hotels or homes as domestic servants are sexually vulnerable. terrified by the amount of rape that is happening at the missions, and his letters back to the mother mission are, this whole thing is going to fall apart if we can't stop the spanish soldiersrs from rape o the indian women, how are we ever going to stop it, and

nobody ever answers his letters, there are no back letters from his acknowledgment of the quantity of rape . and it goes through -- the russians have assaulted the alaskan natives. the women currently who are assaulted in prison, the girls who are sent into the hotels from the indian boarding schools, the chinese girls who are kidnapped from the coast and sold on the docks of san francisco, and kept in caged brothels on jackson street that would become grant avenue, there are rows and rows of caged brothels where these girls are sold. a baby was sold for $30. the top prize went to a teenage girl who was sold for $1600.

stripped, options, and sold. we think new orleans. we don't think our docks of san francisco, as a slave done. and the girls who aren't sold ra at the docks are taken to a room in chinatown called the queens room, and they are auctioned and sold there, either to serve the brothels of san francisco or sacramento, or taken up to the gold country. so, as we talk about this, i think we have to think about the children, these are very young girls. and we have to think about women in general. not like in the south where women were sold and tortured and held for their reproductive bodies, but for their sexual bodies, and sexual access. so, i think we can't tell the story without the women. >> no, we certainly can't.

it is a huge part of it. in this case, you take whatever you want from whomever you have, so if it is either the labor on the railroads, et cetera, et cetera, you have got , as you said, agreed for unpaid labor and you mentioned that the spanish -- their whole plan for all of south america and central america was this sort of plantation mentality. unpaid labor. and develop land that was undeveloped from our point of view. >> i think it is real important, though, especially here in california and san francisco, that the chinese men who come to work on the railroad are free. they are working under very detailed, elaborate contracts, but they are paid and they are free people. they are not forced to come here to work on the railroad. the chinese men who come from

the gold rushh come for the sam reason every other man comes from the gold rush, it is an oddly gendered migration where the men come free, but the girls and young women are forced to come here. so, i just think, as we think about asian american history, to recognize that the chinese men who come, and when the railroad is finished, they come down from the sierra mountains, from truckee, nevada city, and come down, and they start all of the chinatown's across california, and the women who start the chinatown's, many of them were these enslaved girls who were either bought by one of their customers were freed by one of their customers, or they fled, heroic stories, they fled to the rural towns, marysville,

ukiah, eureka, they fled to the rural towns to -- and they are the women -- you are not going to have a town without family, without women and children at legacy. so, these freed runaway girls are -- are having families, mainly with chinese men. who have come down from the railroads. or who stayed after the gold rush. meanwhile, we have all the anti- chinese immigration laws. the exclusion acts that are trying to purge and do purge the united states. >> i'm going to ask a few questions here from the audience. one was direct on this point here, what was the impact of the emancipation proclamation on california, because you point out it only served [ indescernible ] >> the

emancipation proclamation, it is not only one race. the emancipation proclamation is only -- it is 1863, the war is not over, lincoln is under all of this pressure, this war is not about -- this war is about slavery. he really is trying to think about it as keeping the united states as a whole, but the civil war, as we all know, is a war over slavery and the war to expand slavery. 1863, under pressure, lincoln finally gets it and he writes, you know, the emancipation proclamation of 1863. it only frees enslaved people who live in states that have signed up to the confederacy. so, states like delaware where there is a huge population of enslaved people. not in the confederacy, those enslaved people are not free to print so, the emancipation proclamation is a little bit

like tolerate, it has got one pressure loophole in it. and it certainly covers the states in the confederacy. by enslaved black people are already fleeing. this is kind of closing the barn door a little bit, but it was hugely important. and then it leads to the 13th amendment >> and it was also politically timed. i mean, they held it back for ng quite a while, and put that clause in about only the confederacy states, because they don't want to lose kentucky who was -- >> maryland, delaware -- >> so, we only have 10, 15 minutes left, so we are going to ask a couple more questions and we are going to finish with the reparations issue, there is a question on that. so, how did spanish and russian slavery different from slavery of africans? were families separated?

>> the definition of what constitutes chattel slavery, you can spend a lot of time on that term. it generally involves the ownership, the purchase, the sale of enslaved people. it also involves the right to the children who are born of an enslaved woman. there is no legal right to the child, the su of an enslaved women in california, yet the children who were born at the mission, the children who were born of the enslaved chinese girls, the children, some of whom are mixed race, because they are fathered through rape by the russian fur traders and the russian soldiers, are not absolutely legally enslaved.

i think, without going too far into the weeds, the constitution has a big buy. the constitution has a big buy and it on behalf of slave owners, and it says that slave holders have 20 years until 1808, to hold onto -- to keep the global slave trade of africans going. so, there is a crush to by enslaved people from the time of the constitution until 1808. 1808 is a deadly, deadly time for enslaved african american women, because it falls to them with the end of the slave trade from africa. it falls to the women to reproduce the next generations of enslaved black people. children in the plantation system.

so, that is part of the definition of chattel slavery. that does not hold legally in california. but they back door into it. the national fugitive slave act of 1850 doesn't work for california, because an enslaved person hasn't crossed the border to find freedom. so, california rewrites it. i didn't learn this, but -- in high school or at berkeley. california writes its own fugitive slave act of 1852, and it says that slave owners voluntarily brought enslaved people into california and they can be trapped and sold if they flee within the state. they don't have to cross the border to do that. it also builds and there's a very scary thing called the sojourner law.

slave holders could say, we are not living in california, we are just sojourning. crummy verb. and we are going to leave. and so, the california fugitive slave act builds a that people can keep enslaved people in the state, enslaved african americans in the state for three years. it is a three-year forgiveness by. and that gives them time to either decide to settle here or return after abusing, using people for three years. >> another one, the well-known africanist alley states and one of his books that the root cause for slavery was capitalism and the need for cheap labor. can you say the same about enslaving native americans and by extension, new immigrants or migrants in human trafficking

today? >> i think the need for unpaid labor runs through every iteration of slavery that we have been talking about, whether it is a mercantile economy, a capitalist economy, a prophet economy, that human trafficking -- how these all feed together, is of course very complicated, but the need for unpaid -- the greed for unpaid labor is a huge drive towards the enslavement of other people. but power, assault, rape, and the development of this incredible land of california that was peacefully lived on for between 6000 and 12,000 years, before the spanish arrived, and who was going to work this land? >> what was the relationship between african stories of

slavery and native american stories of slavery? >> well, it was something in my -- in my spirit, my politics, that i hope to find, and i didn't. and i have come to understand that people who are really, truly desperate and i thinking of their own freedom and their own survival are not at a point where they can build across languages, across geographies, where they are building coalitions with other people. the biggest place where different ethnic and racial groups were aware of each other's situation was in the right to testify in court. it is throughout the first laws of california that neither african americans, native americans, or chinese people are allowed to testify in court. and they talk about it when they talk about the need to

testify. and there are three colored conventions. the first civil rights movement in california copies this national movement of colored conventions all across the united states. the first three in california are only about the right to testify. and they focus very much on the situation of free blacks who can't testify to the fact that they are free. if you are hauled into court and you can't produce your paper, you can't enter into evidence your freedom paper, then you can be enslaved again. so, it is to divide between freedom and the right to testify, but i didn't expect to find that one overarching issue, the unified thread among free black people in california.

i wanted to mention briefly your story about charlie brown in 1863, who did exactly what rosa parks did years later, i thought that was a fascinating, an unfortunate -- that the same problem had to be pushed back problem had to be pushed back >> can we just say who charlotte brown was? >> go ahead. >> it is a great story in the book, charlotte brown please -- >> we had the head of the human rights commission here, we will not ignore the issue of reparations today. but okay, charlotte brown. women are not supposed i was at the california historical society, i found this little torn piece of paper , looks like a supermarket bag, charlotte brown, wednesday helps the system in san

francisco, charlotte brown is the daughter of a powerful african american figure in san francisco history, james brown, his daughter, she goes to ride the new tram, the new trolley just built and they kick her off. she rides again and they kick her off because they say a black woman cannot be seated next to a white woman. i was really intrigued and wanted to find the story. 100 years ahead of rosa parks. they throw charlotte off the train and she decides to do it as a test case. the next time she gets thrown off, she and her dad, incredible moving story , plan for her to ride again, deliberately thrown off and sue.

they sue the trolley company and they win and she has the right to ride the train. she is not satisfied and goes back and her dad takes a note and writes on this crappy piece of paper, today, i bought charlotte two tickets to ride the tram again. this is deliberate political gesture and archive and to me, it meant the inspiration from a very savvy father who knows exactly how to record the deliberateness of what he has done and charlotte brown gets thrown off again and sues again and she wins several hundred dollars this time and the permanent right for african americans to write not the trolley system in california 100 years ahead of rosa parks. as someone that learned so much from my dad, when i saw that

little piece of deliberate paper , i felt the relationship and power and the history and touching, physically touching that document was so inspiring of what we owe our children. >> the history is awful, we don't learned that accurate history, how are we supposed to fix the future based on inaccurate information? first of all, thank you for making this much more accurate history on what we have done to each other. crucial first step. the crucial second step is it is nice to diagnose the problem but what do you do about it? working under reparations, speaking in front of them and where do you think we should go to make this better?

>> i have not been actively working. i did speak before that san francisco reparations commission last week but it was to give context and support for the incredible work the san francisco reparations commission has done and california reparations commission, two formidable initiatives because slavery costs. i don't believe apologies, everyone is issuing apologies right now, apologies for the exclusion, admission, enslavement. i think witnessing matters, stories matter, history matters, truth matters. i don't think truth always fixes the problem and that era

we are living in, the denial of fact, the denial of truth makes us understand that apologies can be tepid. they can acknowledge the truth but they don't fix it. everywhere that slavery happened it cost. it cost native americans all of their land. it cost alaska natives, when they were transported here, very gendered culture, the men hunted seals and sea lions for food. they did not eat the otters because it did not taste good. you could not snag a whale in a kayak. without the men, the women whose task was to dig for roots and to cook and build the kayaks were starving. slavery cost hunger. the

african americans brought out here, who are separated from their families, they could not provide for their families, either free or enslaved, there was no paid labor if you are enslaved. there is a reckoning. my reason for testifying was to really speak to the history of slavery in california. i firmly believe anyone who is the descendent of an enslaved person has paid dearly for the history, the legacy they have been brought into. they have lost education, food, wages, lost access to their family. they have been imprisoned for irrelevant or unimportant crimes like marijuana that is now legal . people we know have gone to

jail several years for marijuana , suddenly they lost all of these years, critical young years for something that is now legal. slavery costs and the $8.5 billion that has been assigned, one of the first numbers, dollar figures nationally, that has been pegged to the reparations movement, it will be debated who gets it. howdy prove it, how many generations down? those will be hard secessions. what the reparations commission has understood, that slavery cost. it cost in terms of money, legacy, inheritance of wages, skill sets, of health. that has to be paid for.

there is no apology that will make that restitution okay. the reparations, in my view, the definition i use is repairs. reparations are justice that repairs. when we turn to the justice park, we get, when we get to the repair part, we have to acknowledge it will be very expensive to create the equality that will relaunch california. >> our societies are based on ideas, it seems to be one of the crucial things that needs to be done to realize that determinism and fate of these ideas that allow us to look at other people as objects and not as individual free willed people that need to be respected about their mind pick as long as we do that, we will

always be able to do that. we will always be able to think of other people as objects for our use. until we see everybody as individual mind with their own free will, always have a chance of slipping back into this so we have to keep on the issue. >> i think democracy is about ideas, it starts with an idea, idea of equality and access to justice. and idea of economic equality i believe is slavery has turned human beings into objects that can be both and sold, raped, abused . think about the children, right now we don't know who we call our kids. we are supporting post-docs

and think of them as kids pick the notion of childhood in america keeps getting longer and longer. we are thinking babies that were sold for $30. thinking of young children, young native american boys who built the fields in california, of enslaved african americans who dug the gold and mines on behalf of their owner. young men brought because they were sturdy and healthy and they had skills. they knew how to manage oxen and cattle. nobody knew how to dig for gold . i think the notion of children has to be brought into our notion of justice. >> we have finished another event at the commonwealth club, 121st year of enlightened discussion. thank you for spending those years writing more accurate history about slavery in

california and for sharing it with all of us, thanks a lot. >> thank you. [ applause ] >> the tv eversunday on c- span 2 th authors discussing latest nonfiction books. former usa today editor in chief and vietnam war veteran recounts his experiences in vietnam, his reer in journalism and shares hi recent novel, a vietnam war mystery. at 10:00 p.m. eastern on afterwards, ruth simmons shares her journey from poverty to academia. serving at brown college, in her book up ho and interviewed by author. watch book tv every sunday on c-span 2

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